AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 48 / 106

Plate 48 of 106 · Second World War · Escort fighter and fighter-bomber

Republic P-47 Thunderbolt

P-47D-40-RA, painted as 45-49295, a Republic P-47D-40-RA Thunderbolt built at Evansville, Indiana, in 1945 with a Pratt & Whitney R-2800-59 Double Wasp, later flown by the Yugoslav Air Force as 13064, kept by the Yugoslav Aeronautical Museum in Belgrade, brought to Britain in 1985 and acquired by the RAF Museum, painted as it is shown at RAF Museum London in the colours of Thunderbolt II KL216 ‘RS-L’ of No. 30 Squadron, South East Asia Command, 1945: Dark Green and Dark Earth over Medium Sea Grey, a white cowling ring, a white band on the fin carrying the squadron’s palm badge, white bands on the tailplanes and white gun-bay leading edges, dark and light blue SEAC roundels and fin flash, blue ‘RS’ and ‘L’ codes, ‘KL216’ in white on the rear fuselage and fin, the bubble canopy and dorsal fin fillet, and a black four-blade Curtiss paddle propeller with yellow tips; it never served with the RAF, and the upper-wing camouflage pattern is approximated because it has not been photographed from above.

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as 45-49295, a Republic P-47D-40-RA Thunderbolt built at Evansville, Indiana, in 1945 with a Pratt & Whitney R-2800-59 Double Wasp, later flown by the Yugoslav Air Force as 13064, kept by the Yugoslav Aeronautical Museum in Belgrade, brought to Britain in 1985 and acquired by the RAF Museum, painted as it is shown at RAF Museum London in the colours of Thunderbolt II KL216 ‘RS-L’ of No. 30 Squadron, South East Asia Command, 1945: Dark Green and Dark Earth over Medium Sea Grey, a white cowling ring, a white band on the fin carrying the squadron’s palm badge, white bands on the tailplanes and white gun-bay leading edges, dark and light blue SEAC roundels and fin flash, blue ‘RS’ and ‘L’ codes, ‘KL216’ in white on the rear fuselage and fin, the bubble canopy and dorsal fin fillet, and a black four-blade Curtiss paddle propeller with yellow tips; it never served with the RAF, and the upper-wing camouflage pattern is approximated because it has not been photographed from above. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (1.2 MB)

Data plate

Specification

First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (); engine, crew and dimensions are for the P-47D-40-RA modelled here.

History

The Thunderbolt

Republic Aviation of Farmingdale, Long Island, the former Seversky company, had built a line of radial-engined fighters to the designs of its chief engineer, Alexander Kartveli. In 1940 the US Army Air Corps, impressed by reports from the air war over Europe, asked for something much heavier and better armed. Kartveli designed the largest single-seat fighter yet built around the new Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp, with a General Electric turbo-supercharger in the rear fuselage and ducting running the length of the aircraft to feed it, and eight .50 in machine guns in an elliptical wing. The XP-47B first flew from Farmingdale on 6 May 1941.

The Thunderbolt reached England with the Eighth Air Force’s 56th, 78th and 4th Fighter Groups, which flew their first combat missions in April 1943. It was heavy and slow to climb, but at high altitude the turbo-supercharger gave it full power, and it could out-dive anything the Luftwaffe flew. The 56th Fighter Group kept its Thunderbolts throughout the war and finished as the Eighth’s highest-scoring fighter group. Pilots called it the Jug, and they valued its ability to absorb damage and bring them home. From the P-47D-25 it had a cut-down rear fuselage and a bubble canopy, and later blocks added a dorsal fin fillet and larger fuel tanks.

As the Mustang took over the long escort missions, the Thunderbolt became the Allies’ outstanding fighter-bomber. With the Ninth Air Force it attacked bridges, trains, armour and airfields across France and Germany, carrying bombs and rockets under its wings, and it fought in Italy, the Pacific and Burma. The RAF received about 830 Thunderbolts, which equipped sixteen squadrons in Burma in 1944 and 1945. In all 15,636 were built at Farmingdale and Evansville, Indiana, more than any other American fighter. After the war Thunderbolts served the Air National Guard and many other air forces, the last of them in Latin America into the 1960s.

This airframe

P-47D-40-RA 45-49295, painted as Thunderbolt II KL216 “RS-L”

45-49295The airframe modelled

45-49295 was built at Evansville, Indiana, in 1945 as a P-47D-40, one of the last Thunderbolts made. After the war it was supplied to the Yugoslav Air Force, which flew it as 13064, and it was later kept by the Yugoslav Aeronautical Museum in Belgrade. It came to Britain in 1985, and the RAF Museum acquired it the following year. It has been displayed at Hendon since the mid-1990s, painted as Thunderbolt II KL216, “RS-L” of No. 30 Squadron, which flew Thunderbolts on ground-attack sorties against the Japanese in Burma in 1945. It never served with the RAF itself. The model shows it as displayed: Dark Green and Dark Earth over Medium Sea Grey, the white cowling ring, fin band and tailplane bands of South East Asia Command, with the squadron’s palm badge on the fin band, dark and light blue SEAC roundels and fin flash, the blue codes RS and L, “KL216” in white on the rear fuselage and fin, the bubble canopy and dorsal fin fillet, and a black four-blade Curtiss propeller with yellow tips. The upper-wing camouflage has not been photographed from above, so its pattern is approximated.

See it at Royal Air Force Museum London

Where to see one

In the gazetteer

The gazetteer records the Thunderbolt in 2 UK collections. The airframe modelled here is marked.

Every airframe and serial All 106 plates

Profiles and models are procedural interpretations built in Blender from published dimensions, three-view drawings and photographs of each airframe. Treat the museum aircraft as the reference.